Operations Server Instructions

[caryatid23]

Hey all, 

 

Updated top post ( June 2020 )

 

Attached is a zip archive of the groups demonstrated in the below video. Please feel free to comment or DM for any questions. Server, more instruction videos, and some example missions forthcoming in the following weeks!

 

Example mission demonstrated in the videos is now attached. 

sprue_v5.001.zip

example_mission.zip

Edited June 18, 2020 by caryatid23
new shiz ma doods

[caryatid23]

Errata: using lots of AI aircraft was suggested by Skoop; although I said Dakpilot in the video. Apologies to both.

[coconut]

Watched the first video of the two. My initial impressions when you showed your work were that your work was complex and it wasn't clear what problem it was solving. Now it's a lot more clear to me, you are providing (possibly complex) basic logic wrapped in uniform interfaces (init, start, success, failure, shutdown...). That's great work, these building blocks should greatly help people get started with building missions. I think the raw mission editor is a bit too low-level for the general population, but these ready-to-use groups should help make things more accessible.

 

Eventually, I think we'll need some sort of wiki to gather and document all groups people create. A video is good to introduce concepts, but once you start using these things, a written reference is needed.

 

Edit: I just thought about something. Have you though a more fine-grained approach to mission success than a binary Success/Failure? For instance, think of a convoy providing reinforcements to the front line. If half of it makes it to the destination, the front line gets reinforced with half the resources.

 

There's a cost (more complex API) though, so I'm not sure it's worth doing. I did that for my VLuki counter-offensive, but this mission ended up being way more complex that it should have been, and I'm a bit reluctant to keep developing it in its current state.

Edited August 17, 2015 by coconut

[caryatid23]

Hi Coconut - - the work was initially complex much more complex If you include the first set-up I built for RoF this is the 4th rebuild; simplified each time. The first two systems were actual Von Neumann style - I designed a `bit` group. Made 4 bit words and created a processor pipeline by using those bits to make 14 registers, and logical constructs built up out bits into NAND gates and storage for unit/war state ( all built using only timers, activate, and deactivate ).  The goal was create real processing for wide area AI; that had no outside dependencies.  I still have those and actually pull out the NAND built operators sometimes ( i have <, >=, ==, != operators for the 4 bit words that I still kind use to generate that phase guage thing ). I'm also happy to share those. They work great, but the msbin w/o any units ( just the logics ) is over 1 Meg and the performance of the computation and of units was not good enough.

The build before this one of this system was very similar to this but had a more complex API for the core compoents. Inputs := (Activate, Deactiave, Run, Improve, Weaken, More Aggresseive, More Defensive, Special action 1, special action 2). Outputs := (trigger on any successful unit*, trigger on any dead unit*, trigger on done, ready for special action1, ready for special action 2)

 

To complexity from the Boolean output here -- I build complexity up now; by constructing those succ/fail units into larger constructs that I call "operations". Videos on that are coming up. -- The testing missions that have been up over the last few days had 3 operations per side. Each operation containing ~7 of those core components connected as a binary tree, with Success to the right, and Fail to the Left. It is  actually a zipper treated as if the focus is the current computation in a continuation; say this just cause sounds like you're down with CS shiate. The success and failure of an operation is defined as a result of movement through that tree to the most extreme bounds. Then the success and failure of those operations is stored in that bounded "phase guage" thing and that controls the results of the whole side.

 

The idea being that users of the system can build up any functional structure based an output type of ( Succ, Fail, Shutdown ) and input argument of ( Init, Activate, Shutdown [ other args are optional ] ). I chose Zippers but they could be skip lists, linked lists, trie trees, any b-tree, etc: generally with the idea of overloading the position in the structure for semantics.  Totally agree on the need for text. I do the videos, honestly, for the sake of my laziness.

 

I'll be releasing an "automata" zip that will include some of these larger constructs. Currently I have 3 larger ones that represent generalized actions of an "army", an "air force", and "supply lines".

 

Let me know if you want any more detail; Also I'd be happy to show you first hand; but prolly not for a couple weeks; kinda booked up

 

 

*because you may have noticed multiple things hitting a timer trigger inside a 20 ms window has in-consistent output. 2 in may equal 1 out, or 2 out -- this is what lead me to believe that the internal event loop runs at 20ms but I don't really know that. So I have a little `quantizer` group I use that can swallow events that occur to quickly. 

[Skoop]

There's a cost (more complex API) though, so I'm not sure it's worth doing. I did that for my VLuki counter-offensive, but this mission ended up being way more complex that it should have been, and I'm a bit reluctant to keep developing it in its current state.

Man, bad news in a sense that its a great mission. I tout it as the best overall mission in the game to date... really unique.

[caryatid23]

Coconut I'm looking forward to giving the VLuki counter-offensive a go -- planning on finally playing the game  Complexity is like complex maaaaaan.

 

 

 

Here is new video also QMB style, although more complex. It continues from the previous.

The intention is to replicate the idea of the "Fly Now" missions from Rise of Flight here in Bo[sM].

 

[coconut]

Man, bad news in a sense that its a great mission. I tout it as the best overall mission in the game to date... really unique.

 

Thanks, I'm truly honored 

[caryatid23]

Hey All --

 

Been building stuff out -- Here is a video introducing new components. They are built up from the groups in the previous videos. 

Essentially the aim is to allow building of missions from references; books, maps, ideas, etc. 

 

Introduction to the Automata system:

Automata group referenced in the above video:

Introductory gameplay video here:

^ that mission ( slightly bugfixed ) is running currently on the server 

 

[caryatid23]

Hi.

 

New video below. Continues from previous; although previous not required. The video demonstrates the preliminary set-up steps to building a mission.

[II./JG1_Kliegmann]

When I try to open the group file for the boneyard 0.3.6, I get an "Error reading group file".  Any solutions?

[[DBS]Tx_Tip]

When I try to open the group file for the boneyard 0.3.6, I get an "Error reading group file".  Any solutions?

Nope unless Caryatid23 still has the group and updated his game to current version and then resubmits the group it is gone for good.

Tip

[II./JG1_Kliegmann]

Figured out the problem, it works now

[56RAF_klem]

Just found this. Look incredible. I also get the error message but am now in 3.001.

 

Is there an updated version?

[56RAF_klem]

If anyone is still interested in this I finally got it to load into the editor. I had to change all the .Group file references of 'CheckEntities' to 'CheckPlanes'.

Revised zip file attached.

 

That's as far as I've got, I haven't actually used the modules yet.

automata_boneyard_v0.3.6.klem.zip

[caryatid23]

Hello!

 

Been 4 years and I was out a sim computer until April of last year: But I have rebuilt the system from the ground up! Simpler to use, faster ( performance wise ), and much more flexible.

New release and videos coming this weekend.

Enjoy!

[caryatid23]

First instructional video is out -- I'll keep the top post up to date going forward. There is a download of the groups in a zip file there and the first video; posted here too:

 

[caryatid23]

Moar updates :: simpler system. See first post. Missions on the way

Edited June 17, 2020 by caryatid23

[LF_Sire]

Thanks @caryatid23 for share.

I have written a short 'first impressions' review on my virtual squadron board here (in spanish).

I want to gather time to study your system as it is a very interesting concept. Unfortunately the result is really complex to be a general public succes but I'm sure it well deserves the time to learn about it. Thanks for share.